Walnut Creek planning commissioners urge council to prioritize housing, office reuse, infrastructure and disaster resiliency

Walnut Creek Planning Commission members on an item focused on input for the City Council’s biennial priority-setting process recommended that council emphasize housing, reuse of underutilized office space, broader infrastructure needs and disaster resiliency while retaining attention to diversity, equity and inclusion and environmental sustainability. Erica Van de Brand, Community Development Director, told commissioners that the council’s next priority-setting meeting is scheduled for Feb. 11 and asked the commissioners to identify roughly three to five recommended priorities for the next two years.

The commissioners said the city has completed much of the initial work on several items but recommended shifting emphasis on how those programs are implemented. "This is your evening to be able to talk about and share information ... regarding upcoming priorities for the next two years," said Erica Van de Brand, Community Development Director, opening the discussion.

Why it matters: Council priorities guide the city’s budgeting and project planning for the next two years. The commission’s input will be summarized by staff and forwarded to the council as informal recommendations.

Commissioners debated the five areas that appear in the staff packet — diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI); economic development and job creation; environmental sustainability and climate action; parks, facilities and other infrastructure; and public safety and social wellness — and identified additional cross-cutting concerns that they believe merit explicit emphasis.

DEI: Commissioners said the core DEI programs are in place but recommended keeping the topic on council’s radar with a shifted focus from initial program creation toward recruitment, mentoring and monitoring. "I am reluctant to take this off as a priority because I think doing so would be a step backward," said Commissioner Klopp, who urged continued work on diversifying commission and committee membership and expanding leadership-training programs such as the City Leadership Academy.

Housing, office reuse and economic development: Commissioners recommended that council make housing and the reuse of underutilized office and commercial properties a central priority. Members noted post-pandemic shifts in work patterns and suggested the city pursue options to encourage activation of vacant commercial sites for mixed use, housing or co-working/remote-work hubs. Commissioners also urged using data from the city’s recently adopted housing element — including vacancy and commercial-usage data gathered for RHNA compliance — to identify suitable conversion or redevelopment opportunities.

One commissioner recommended the city consider a general plan update to address gaps in zoning, adapt to changing office uses and support more flexible reuse of commercial parcels; staff told the commission the city’s current general plan dates to February 2006 and covers through 2025. Commissioners praised recent permit-streamlining efforts but noted that streamlining generally applies to housing developments and does not change statutory timelines for CEQA analysis. Staff and commissioners discussed CEQA exemptions (listed in the California Environmental Quality Act statutory categories, including the sections commonly cited as 15168 and 15169) as potential accelerators for certain projects, while noting that CEQA review timelines themselves are a statutory process outside the city’s unilateral control.

Environmental sustainability and disaster resiliency: Several commissioners said the city has established a sustainability program and hired a sustainability manager, so the commission recommended changing the emphasis from program creation to monitoring implementation. At the same time, commissioners stressed the need to treat disaster resiliency — especially wildfire mitigation and related insurance impacts — as an explicit priority. One commissioner recommended moving disaster resiliency from the environmental category into public safety and social wellness so it remains a standing priority.

Parks, facilities and other infrastructure: Commissioners acknowledged progress on Heather Farms/Heather Park Community Center and Aquatic Center work but urged that the council broaden the infrastructure priority to include roads, utilities, flood control, trails and communications infrastructure (including public Wi‑Fi and technology access). Commissioners suggested the city continue seeking federal and state partnerships and grants for large-scale capital projects, citing ongoing canal-area and bridge work as examples of multiagency funding efforts.

Public safety and social wellness: Commissioners recommended continued emphasis on homelessness response (including the city’s partnerships with Contra Costa County programs and local service providers), and urged the council to consider options for year-round shelter capacity rather than short winter-only operations; staff noted this year’s winter shelter was set for approximately two and a half months. Commissioners also raised concerns about organized retail theft’s effect on downtown safety and economic vitality and suggested a coordinated, multiagency response. Separately, commissioners asked the city to consider a broader approach to social wellness that examines the local effects of alcohol and legal cannabis licensing rather than treating each permit application only on its own merits.

Transportation, active travel and wayfinding: Commissioners recommended improving wayfinding for visitors, expanding safe bicycle and pedestrian connections (including targeted paint-and-sign interventions and pilot traffic-calming test areas) and better communicating public transit/shuttle options from BART and regional stations. Several commissioners praised recent transportation department pilot projects and urged continued, prioritized investment in high-use pedestrian and bike routes.

Next steps and staff direction: Staff members (Erica Van de Brand, Claire and Sung) said they would compile the commission’s informal consensus notes and forward them to council for its Feb. 11 priority-setting session. No formal votes or motions were taken by the commission on these recommendations during the meeting.

Ending: The commission closed by noting the input will be used as informal guidance for council; staff will synthesize the discussion and supply the commission’s recommendations to the council in advance of the February priority-setting meeting.